Will BJP gain? Not just Western UP, east also turning into communal tinderbox

Lucknow: Mission accomplished in western Uttar Pradesh, now let’s move East - this could well be the call from communal hate-monger elements of all shades in the state. It seems it’s time the eastern and central regions of the state braced for a spate of violent incidents with a strong religious undertone.

Districts in western UP have reported a series of clashes involving two communities for nearly a year now, beginning from Muzaffarnagar in August 2013. This year, clashes have taken place in Moradabad, Hapur and Saharanpur and now, according to intelligence sources, the arena of violence seems to moving eastward. Incidentally by-elections to 12 Assembly seats and one Lok Sabha seat (Mainpuri) are to be held in the next three months, and a polarization along communal or caste lines would benefit some parties.

Already, Bareilly is on the boil and tension is brewing in the eastern UP district of Ambedkarnagar. Both these places, incidentally, have witnessed prolonged violence on different occasions in the last two years.

Sources in the police say that the month of Saawan or Shravan in the Hindu calendar is an uneasy one for police in Uttar Pradesh. Throughout this month devotees of Lord Shiva travel long distances carrying kaanwars to be deposited at a major Shiv temple in the region. (The kaanwar is a wood and bamboo structure at the two ends of which there are baskets in which Ganga water is carried for offering to the deity.) This ritual is an article of faith for mostly rural men who not only expect freedom of movement on highways or through towns, but also indulge in rowdyism en route.

Although the practice is common in northern and central India, in UP it has become a cause of concern for the police. The kaanwariyas expect all traffic including heavy-duty trucks and roadways buses to be stopped when they are moving on the roads, even National Highways. The men decide to take rest whenever and wherever they please and often play loud music, harass passers-by and resort to violence and arson at the drop of a hat.

“Their unruly behavior puts the police in a bind since use of force in controlling them may lead to the situation taking a communal turn,” says a police officer who had been posted in west UP some months ago.

The prolonged riots in Bareilly in June-July 2012 had been caused over a dispute on playing loud music by kaanwariyas near a mosque. Tension had continued to grip the city for weeks as there was a relapse of violence within a month. Bareilly city has been witnessing minor skirmishes involving two communities in past weeks and the kaanwariyas are at the root of at least one such incident.

On the other hand, Tanda had erupted in violence in March 2013 when a local Hindu Yuva Vahini leader Ram Babu Gupta had been shot dead in full public view. In December the same year, Gupta’s nephew too was killed in similar fashion. The involvement of a Samajwadi Party leader had been established in the incident.

Tension has been prevailing in Tanda for the last few days, again owing to rowdyism by the kaanwariyas who blocked the highway and set fire to several UP Roadways buses.

The poll-bound Assembly seats are spread from Noida, Saharanpur, Bijnor, Kairana, Thakurdwara in west, to Nighasan, Balha (Bahraich), Lucknow East in central, Hamirpur, Charkhari in Bundelkhand, to Sirathu and Rohaniya in the east. Voter polarization in western UP in the wake of the Muzaffarnagar riots had worked to the advantage of the Bharatiya Janata Party in the recent Lok Sabha election, and the possibility of a similar ploy being used by not only the BJP but other parties also cannot be ruled out.

Ramesh Dixit, professor of political science in Lucknow University, says that as of today, the coming by-elections matter the most to all political parties and the stakes of the BJP are the highest. “The BJP has tasted success in the Lok Sabha election as a result of its polarization that began after Muzaffarnagar. The mind of BJP’s strategists seems to be engaged in repeating the process in rest of UP for the by-election battle,” he says.

The explanation of kaanwariyas being a reason for law and order problems in some cases is only a ploy to mislead the people, says Dixit. “The strategy seems to create trouble only in Muslim-dominated areas and by this design, it won’t come as a surprise if trouble arises in other towns in rest of UP also,” he says. Another interesting observation by him is that the trouble-makers in the Muslim community would be “a scared lot” now since the new government took over at the Centre. But he also apprehends that the state might see more communal violence in coming months.

However, Vijay Bahadur Pathak, state spokesman of the BJP, has a different explanation. “The state government and the police have lost their clout. Criminals too are not scared of police action. On top of that, the approach of the state government is completely political; it views even routine incidents of crime from a political perspective,” he says. As for kaanwariyas he says the administrations needs to be prepared for them rather than blame them for every incident.

Pathak recalls an observation of Chief Minister Akhilesh Yadav that crime has no caste. “He had said this after the Saharanpur incident. But now the government tries to give political color to every minor incident. Involvement of people of any caste or community does not reduce its seriousness,” he says.

“No political party wants social clashes to take place for political advantage. After all, the cost of violence has to be paid by the people. But the state government is all the time involved in correcting its socio-political balance,” he says.

In response to the allegation that communal violence in rest of UP would suit the BJP’s interest and therefore it may instigate them, he says even small incidents take on bigger dimensions because of administrative laxity. “The police should try to avoid these rather than blame any political party.”